Children's charity Variety has launched a scheme that allows people to sponsor an individual Kiwi child living below the poverty line for $35 a month, or about $1.15 a day.

The money will pay for things such as school trips, stationery, doctor's visits, books and prescriptions.

The Kiwi Kid sponsorship initiative has been widely applauded, but opposition parties say it should serve as a "massive red flag" to the Government that it is not doing enough for financially disadvantaged children.

The 270 000 children living in poverty at a time when the inequality is at its highest ever don't need charity, they need direct Government intervention.

Allowing Charity groups pick up the slack of poverty lets Paula Bennett and this disastrous Government off the hook. MANA's feed the kids bill is being debated on the 13th of February and the list of groups who came out last week and supported the Government directly funding a universal food program in schools is the who's who of the child poverty world. Child Poverty Action Group, Every Child Counts, Save the Children, Plunket, IHC, PPTA, the NZ Principals’ Federation, the Methodist Church, the NZ Nurses’ Organisation, the CTU Rūnanga, and Te Ora – the Māori Medical Practitioners’ Association.

Those NZ children locked into poverty by a Government focused only on the needs of the top 1% wealth class deserve better than a third world poverty charity program.

Let's just start by bloody feeding these kids first and allow charity to pick up the extras rather than the basics.

We need to build a social floor in NZ and that is the Government's responsibility, leaving it up to Charity groups is an abdication of responsibility as insidious as blaming the parents. When there is an actual solution on the table in the form of the Feed the Kids Bill, pointing to Charity involvement as a means of looking like the Government are doing something is disingenuous in the extreme.

6 Comments:

The methods of calculating that 270,000 figure are rather dubious. As noted in the Herald, the UN defines extreme poverty as living on US$1.25 ($1.50) a day. On that basis we should be poverty-free but in a classic example of a ghost catcher inventing ghosts, the Commissioner gets creative.

If your parents earn less than $600 a week, you are living in poverty. Not because this is not enough money to live on, but because it is 60 per cent of the median average income, a formula that guarantees poverty.

The Government subsidises kindergarten, pays for education, and health care.

The real issue is family planning and use of contraception - this is how people get out of poverty around the world.

It's 60% of the median income (not average). It doesn't guarantee poverty e.g. if 4 people earn 100,000 then that's the median income, 60% of that is $60,000 but noone earns less than that so noone is in poverty.

The main issue I see in this measurement is that it is based on family income. If the mother takes time away from work to look after her children than the family can appear to be in poverty but this break could have planned and they could be financially confortable with a financial nest egg while being in "poverty".

@ M . If everybody used contraception we'd soon run out of arseholes . Poverty stricken people around the world get out of poverty by getting more money and a general improvement in their lot . Have you not noticed that an almost unimaginably small population of people have a vast amount of the wealth on our planet ? It's been in the news of late .

And the Government , ie us should fucking subsidize health , education and healthcare . In fact our government , ie us , should be able to provide FREE fucking health care , preschool ' education ' etc , etc .

It's been the mantra of neoliberal tinkering to try to separate US from OUR government all along . We ARE the Government ! The Government IS US ! What about that is so fucking mysterious ?

Now and then one or two of them rich folk throw a few crumbs about if only to secure a front row seat in the hereafter but by and large , once they have all them dollars , they never let them go again . Check out this fine lineup . http://boingboing.net/2013/01/23/visualizing-the-net-worth-of-t.html

Poverty is when you can't afford to eat when ones essential cost of living overpowers ones income . It's that simple .

And who pushes up the cost of living ? Our Government ? Then it's no longer our Government .

C is for contraception also for caring catering concern carrot catholic cabbage catharsis etcI can't help thinking that a charity such as this well meaning as it may be provides an open invitation to those not so well intentioned towards vulnerable childrenwhy cannot we just look after the children who avoided the "contraception" and have already been born and why do we suffer a government which obviously has no intention of doing sowhen a pm says it's not the governments job to create jobs alarm bells should be jangling

@ Francis Jane ; You ask , why do we suffer a government who have no intention of taking care of the collective US , or our progeny ?

My answer ; Because we're so complacent , they don't have to .

You say there should be alarm bells ringing .

Well , F.J . They are ringing . Virtually every single Government department is ringing every bell they can find . Education , health , Welfare , The courts system , the prison system , the public transport system and now the postal system . Every single one of the above mentioned has been , or is on TV , radio or in the news papers expressing their dire concerns for our immediate and distant future .

Every single departmental H.O.D. gets muzzled by their respective MP . Have you not noticed that ?

The 800,000 people who should have voted , didn't and that should be their eternal shame . The Neoliberals have nothing to worry about .

And while on that subject ; lets call them what they are . Neo liberals . To speak of a New Zealand government suggests we , as a people still have the reigns to control where , what and who goes on . We do not have control of our Government ! The neo liberals do . I mean , it's pretty fucking obvious I'd have thought . The News brought to you by some dirty bankster or Insurance Co-ck and the weather brought to you by a fucking annoying phone company . Hello ...?

The neo-liberals have control of our media , they have control of our daily lives , they own our essential infrastructures , and they will destroy anybody who gets in the way of their agenda and that agenda is to own and operate New Zealand as a safe haven as the horrible and inevitable shit storm on the horizon sweeps across the planet .

How do we fix it ?

It's easy . Ask the Crown to install a temporary , generic Government comprised of White Hall representatives while a complete , thorough and independent inquiry is carried out with regard to the relationships between current Neo Liberals , past politicians and their Corporate Masters .

Hahahahahaaahahahahahaahahahahah ...... Hahahahahahaahahahah !

Fuck ! For a minute there , I even had myself going .

Yeah , nah ! We're rooted mate .

Sell the tele , buy a case of clearskins and enjoy this beautiful summer .